Starlight
by Monkshood92
Summary: SONGFIC. "Starlight" - Muse. RAYNE. Jayne's point of view.


**A/N**

My first songfic ever! I was listening to _"Starlight"_ by Muse, and all of a sudden it reminded me of Jayne. I wonder what kind of music he would listen to?

* * *

**--STARLIGHT--**

_**Far away**_

_**This ship has taken me far away**_

_**Far away from the memories**_

_**Of the people who care if I live or die**_

Jayne sat on his bunk, reading the latest letter from his mother. He read aloud in broken, halting, disjointed words as he tried to decipher the mystery that was the written word. On his head sat the orange beanie his mother had sent, his most treasured possession, next to Vera, of course. His ma told him that his older sister was expecting her second child, and that his younger sister had finally realised that Jayne's childhood friend loved her to pieces. His ma was also pleased to tell him that his cousin Mattie had finally recovered from the bout of flu he contracted last winter. Jayne missed all of them. _Serenity_ only ever seemed to take him further and further away from his memories.

_**The Starlight**_

_**I will be chasing a starlight**_

_**Until the end of my life**_

_**I don't know if it's worth it anymore**_

Some days Jayne regretted leaving home for a life of dashing heroics. He had left the farm in search of adventure, and an ideal that was so tenuous and incomplete, like smoke, that he barely had the words to describe it. Being a mercenary was not all it was cut out to be. Sure, he got to run around beating people up, and there was *usually* food on the table. But , sometimes, Jayne thought that he could've done all that at home anyway. He even would've gotten a bed for the night, albeit in the cramped holding cells of the local enforcement outpost. Jayne didn't know if it was worth it anymore.

_**Hold you in my arms**_

_**I just wanted to hold you in my arms**_

Then he met River Tam. At first he didn't like the girl. She was crazy, dangerous, and a threat to his comfort zone. A prime example of all three characteristics was the scar across his chest, inflicted by the girl in an attempt to refresh his colour scheme. But gradually, as Jayne spent more time with her, he began to see other traits. She was intelligent, and humorous, and graceful in all that she did. As the mercenary learnt more of what had been done to River, he found himself becoming protective of her. The girl was so broken inside, it made Jayne angry. He wanted to kill the people at the academy, and then hold River in his bloodstained arms.

_**My life**_

_**You electrify my life**_

_**Let's conspire to ignite**_

_**All the souls that would die just to feel alive**_

Jayne would never forget the day River had come silently down into his cabin as he lay leafing through a gun magazine, several cycles old by that time. He had been about to tell her to get out with his usual half-hearted name-calling. To him, 'moonbrain' was a term of endearment. Before the words could cross his lips, she had moved across the room and laid down beside him, burrowing her head into his side. "Hold me." she had whispered, and Jayne had. In the space of a few short months, she became his life, captivating to him, giving colour and meaning back to him. His soul, for so long dead, had been brought back to life. It was like electricity constantly running through his veins. The ideal he had been searching for when he left home, all those years ago, was given a form, and a name. It was called River.

_**I'll never let you go**_

_**If you promise not to fade away**_

_**Never fade away**_

Jayne would never let her go, not ever. Once, she had felt she wasn't wanted. Jayne heard her voice through a haze of sleep, voice breaking with tears. She had threatened to melt and vanish like smoke, and Jayne fully believed her capable of that, just like he believed she really could kill him with her brain, and like he believed she wouldn't kill him. He had made her promise to not fade away, because he would never let her go.

_**Our hopes and expectations**_

_**Black holes and revelations**_

_**Our hopes and expectations**_

_**Black holes and revelations**_

River's dreams and wishes were so far apart from Jayne's, and yet they complemented each other perfectly. Each new day together brought new discoveries, about the other and themselves. Together, they overcame each obstacle that popped up, and there seemed to be a never ending stream of them, the biggest being her brother Simon and his dislike of the mercenary. But Jayne didn't care.

_**Hold you in my arms**_

_**I just wanted to hold you in my arms**_

All he wanted to do was hold River in his arms.


End file.
